Writing: an outlet for our anxiety

One of the many diaries I had growring up

I was running on the treadmill yesterday and reflected on how good it felt to be able to release my anxiety and tension through exercise after a stressful start to the day. Although running has provided me with an outlet for anxiety and an escape from the stresses of life, writing also does that. I’m not talking about writing that I do daily for work, I’m talking about my own personal writing.

I really began putting my thoughts on paper, or in a journal in this case, after receiving a diary as a gift when I was in the fifth grade. Although, I no longer have the diary, from what I remember, highlights included happy moments like birthday celebrations and travel highlights, but many of my entries also included feelings out of frustration, disappointment, anger, and sadness. I remember speaking to someone about journaling several years ago and they said that they used their diary as a way to highlight only happy moments and communicate positive and motivational thoughts. After hearing this, it made me wonder if I had been journaling wrong for all these years? Should I have been writing about only the positive things that happened to me? Well, no—not for me anyway.

Recently, I've been a little more anxious than usual at work, so a friend recommended that I try channeling my anxiety through my pen and onto paper when taking notes. Is this new to me? At first, I thought, yes, it is. And after practicing this, I found out that it works. Should I be surprised? No. I’ve come to realize that this is something that I have been doing since I was a child. The ability to write from the heart and to be authentic has always been my outlet and provided that calming escape for me. Although, it’s been many years since I’ve kept a diary, I realize the benefits of having kept diaries and how they were used as emotional outlets during my youth and young adult years. Now, thanks to the Scribes of Strength, I not only have an outlet for my writing, but I am surrounded by supportive members who share the love of writing and use writing as an outlet just as I do.

I mentioned in other posts on this blog that my love of writing came from my dad who began writing me letters and sending me postcards when I was a child and he was away at sea. Our correspondence continued when I went away to school and lived abroad. Although, my dad was a man of few spoken words, he was a man of many when he wrote. After he lost his voice due to ALS, it was a profound loss, but my dad, fortunately, still had the ability to write until he passed. In looking at his notebook that he used to communicate after losing his voice, I realized that he also channeled his stress and frustration through his pen to paper. He couldn't speak and his movement was limited, so this was his outlet for his anger, frustration, sadness, etc. Looking back on the time before he was diagnosed with ALS, I can now also see in his letters, postcards, and other correspondence, the channeled feelings behind what he wrote. Writing was to him an outlet for love, sadness, anger, frustration, etc. Although not all our escapes were similar, writing is something that we definitely share.

My dad sharing a story with me early into his ALS diagnosis.